Taking the long way 'round
by Fayth3
Summary: It's two years since Miranda and Mal is getting back on track. He's just been taking the long way.


**Taking the long way 'round.**

It's been two years since Miranda.

Two years since Mal held the Shepherd in his arms and watched him bleed to death, his blood staining Mal's favourite shirt; the shirt he'd never wear again.

Two years since Wash had been impaled after the most impressive display of piloting that Mal had ever been privileged to see. Wash's hands still slick with the sweat of riding so close to the wind, even as his body cooled.

Two years since Mal had gone head to head with the Alliance and come out the victor, for the first time.

Two years since he'd plumbed the depths of who he really was and discovered a Mal Reynolds that he didn't recognise.

It had been two years since the top of the world came crashing down, altering life as he knew it.

He had lost a lot on Miranda, things that he thought he hadn't even had to lose.

He'd lost the shreds of belief that the Shepherd had started to instil in him; belief he'd thought long gone.

He'd lost the man who taught him to laugh again and the man who'd made him, and Zoë, believe in a love so deep that it transcended death itself.

He'd lost the respect of his crew as they realised how far he would go to achieve his aims and he'd lost respect for the crew who had balked at following him into hell.

He'd lost part of his humanity as he allowed the Reavers free reign over humans in the sky and he'd lost all pity for the government who'd reduce a young girl to a lab rat and destroy an entire planet in their desperate pursuit for control.

It had been two years since the verse came crashing down around his ears, burying him and leaving him to claw his way out.

Leaving him to throw aside what he'd thought he'd known; who he'd thought he was and try to rebuild and reconnect the pieces that were left.

And he had.

It had been slow, a slow kind of healing.

He'd buried Shepherd and Wash and it had taken him time, but he had dug graves on Haven for everyone; his back aching and hands callused as he'd laid friends and family to rest.

And he'd prayed for them.

He'd thumbed his nose at the Alliance and taken his triumph as the Pyrrhic victory it was; accepting drinks in taverns to commemorate the dead and spread the real deal about Miranda and the Pax.

He'd sat with Zoë for hours and remembered the things Wash used to do, made her smile bitterly and laugh hollowly at the memories. But in time the laughs had become more bittersweet and then sweeter until they were genuine. The smiles had become less forced and brighter.

He'd started to rebuild his faith and trust in his crew, allowing his arms to tuck around Kaylee again without recoiling at the memory of her face when she'd heard his words to strap the dead to the bulkhead.

He was able to visit the infirmary and commend Simon without demanding why he hadn't run quicker, why he hadn't been able to save Wash or the Shepherd.

He was able to look Jayne in the face without wanting to throw him in the airlock for his muttered asides and glowering stares.

He could even greet Inara and not question why she hadn't been injured when everyone around her was all but beaten to death. He could look at her flawless beauty and not hate her for it.

He could sit in the cockpit and not feel guilty that it should be Wash here and not him.

He could swear and cuss and not feel a pang that the Shepherd wasn't around to call him on it.

Two years since he'd lost everything on Miranda.

But he'd found things too.

He'd found a mission again, a sense of purpose that he'd lost after Serenity Valley.

He'd found out exactly who Malcolm Reynolds was, and he kinda liked the guy he'd found he could be.

And he'd also found faith in something other than himself.

He'd done exactly what the Shepherd had asked him to do and just believed in something.

Someone.

It wasn't Inara, no matter what people wanted to think. She could never have his heart and soul when she was scared of the depths that he would go to, the darkness that lay within. She would never understand why he'd allowed death when he could have turned the other way.

Never understood him.

But there was someone who did.

Someone who had fought for what she believed in, but had recognised in him the darkness and hadn't shot, even when she had the chance.

Someone who had gone to any depths to reveal what she knew, even so far as to hurt the one who loved her most in the world, to show them the way.

Someone who had walked the streets even though they cried out to her.

It took a special kind of crazy to walk into the pits of hell, when the demons screamed your name.

Someone who had just watched with pity and understanding and a feeling of kinship as he gave orders for a desecration of their home. Some who understood what that cost him in more than sweat and tears.

Someone who would protect the ones she loved to the death, battling insurmountable odds just to give them time to escape.

Someone who hadn't known if the monster would be killed or if the nightmares would kill her but had fought nonetheless.

Someone who had become his mission, his faith.

Someone he believed in.

Two years ago she had been a broken child; two years ago he had been a broken man.

Slowly he was putting the pieces back together and watching as she did the same.

Her sentences were slower in coming but far more coherent, and he found himself hanging on her words.

Her eyes were clearer, sanity gleaming and he found himself falling into them.

Her smiles were gentler and he tried to tease them out of her whenever he could.

Two years ago he'd have cursed himself for feeling this way and called himself all kinds of names for wanting her. Two years ago he'd have consigned himself to the Special Hell and pushed away his emotions.

Two years ago he hadn't realised what was important.

It was learning to believe again.

Learning to trust again.

Learning to love again.

Yeah he loved her and she knew it.

She was a reader after all.

But she realised that he wasn't quite ready to admit to that. She watched him and smiled at him and let him take the lead.

She fit into his cockpit, his arms and his life and he never wanted her to leave.

He loved her.

It wasn't something that he could deny.

And he was coming to terms with it; with it all.

Life, death, belief and love.

It had been two years since the verse had crashed around his ears, but he was getting it back in perspective again.

He was just taking the long way round.


End file.
